Here’s a preview (practice version?!) of something we prepared for the National Women’s Studies Association — complete with a goofy out-take at the end. (Hint: I cackle.) Thank you, Elizabeth, for leading the way!

As many know, I’m a Fellow at the Woodhull Institute for Ethical Leadership. An exciting announcement: Woodhull and Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty have teamed up to offer “Real Women, Real Success Stories” . Over the next 16 weeks, Woodhull faculty and fellows will be teaching modules that are taught at the leadership retreats–online. Everything officially launched today, and you can get to it all by clicking here.

Congrats, Woodhull!

Ok, I’m on a roll this morning and really MUST get to work (um, paid work). But I just had to share this post from Jessica over at feministing, on some shoddy reporting about how feminism is responsible for the stripping poles some fraternities are apparently installing in their lust dens.

I saw over the weekend that my Guardian piece on why I hope the whole stripping pole business soon goes the way of the old charred bra was picked up by the Kuwait Times last week. Here’s a tidbit from it – I wonder how this reads in Kuwait??:

What the burned bra was to the second wave, the stripping pole has become to the third – a bogey that distracts us from the far less sexy reality that feminism is, and always has been, serious work. It is time to stop deploying rigid and vapid cliches – damsel, good girl and slut – and fixating on the alleged excesses of one contested aspect. We need to keep our eyes on the wider array of women’s issues. May the stripping pole go the way of the charred bra, a quaint reminder of how those calling it from the sidelines got it very wrong.

Two quick hits: Don’t miss this important piece by Courtney Martin on why men should be included in the abortion debate, posted over at AlterNet last week, and this post by Lauren at Faux Real on the usefulness (or not) of the new slang term, “baby daddy.”

A thousand thanks to everyone who came out on Friday night to my reading at Park Slope BN: mother/daughter teams Leslie and Clea Weber and Daph and Rena Uviller; father/daughter team Scott and Grace; Megan McKenna; Jean Casella; fellow Invisible Institute member Christine Kenneally; Susan Doherty; Iggy, all those I didn’t know but asked awesome questions (including Marjory and Sam, in the back), Eryka Peskin from The Red Tent, and, of course, Marco (who promises he’s not yet sick of my schpiel). Shout outs to Samantha for organizing it, and to the post-game crew for eating meat loaf and chocolate cake!

I was only sorry I wasn’t able to make it back on Sat. morning for Lauren Bank Deen’s reading for more on one of my favorite subjects: food. Congrats on Kitchen Playdates, Lauren, and those of you with kids, definitely check it out! Lauren was on The Today Show today, and for those who missed it, there’s a piece by her today on MSNBC.

Turns out the New Yorker’s Shouts and Murmurs isn’t the only place women aren’t being published. Just came upon this uplifting little tidbit, via Inside Higher Ed, about a paper by MIT philosophy professor Sally Haslanger on the limits of progress for women in philosophy. The paper won’t appear until next year, in the journal Hypatia, but Haslanger posted a version of it online and it’s attracting considerable attention. (Total non sequitor: I will always have a soft spot for Hypatia. They published my first academic article, as part of their special “third wave feminism” issue back in 1997.)

Here’s the scoop:

Haslanger studied the gender breakdowns in the top 20 departments (based on The Philosophical Gourmet Report) and found that the percentage of women in tenure track positions was 18.7 percent, with two departments under 10 percent. She also looked at who published in top philosophy journals for the last five years and found that only 12.36 percent of articles were by women.

As Inside Higher Ed goes on to note, “While Haslanger hasn’t made formal proposals for reform, in her essay and in the interview, she spoke of the importance of ensuring that women receive equal treatment through blind review of journal submissions and that ‘efforts ought to be made to make sure women aren’t solo in graduate programs.’”

Interesting discussion going on about it all over at Crooked Timber, an academic group blog I just discovered.

This is cool: At Rutgers, the Office of Promotion of Women in Science, Engineering and Mathematics has created a Girl Geeks / My Story website, where female faculty get personal and fess up about why they became scientists. The pic is of a young Joanna Burger, now a professor in the Department of Cell Biology & Neuroscience, pictured with a gull chick. Aw.

Keep an eye out for girl geek Debby Carr’s story, which I believe be up there soon. Debby is a sociologist and a friend of mine from my Madison days. Her first “crossover” book comes out this spring. It’s about generational conflict among mothers and daughters who make different choices around careers, kids, and, well, life, and when the time comes, I’ll blog bout it here! As may Debby, too.

In a departure from our usual fare, I’m taking a moment to pay homage to a writer my guy Marco adores: Jack Kerouac. It’s the 50th anniversary of the publication of On the Road. (To Marco’s credit, he’s equally obsessed by the writings of the Beat women — Hettie, Joyce, and Diane — go Beat girls!) Check out my dude’s post today over at his blog, Hokum. You won’t think of “scrolling” the same way again.

Please come say hello tonight if you happen to be in Brooklyn! Thanks to the karaoke-wielding Sam, I’ll be reading from and talking about Sisterhood, Interrupted at Barnes and Noble in Park Slope (267 7th Avenue) at 7pm. (Note: there will be no karaoke, just lots and lots of books.)

Marco and I are considering moving to the Slope eventually, so I’m going to pretend this is my neighborhood bookstore and see how it feels.

One lil clarification regarding info in the mammoth newsletter just sent out: Sisterhood, Interrupted is being promoted by the Women’s and Gender Studies Program at the College of Charleston (not the city, the college!) as the official “book group book” for Women’s History Month. (Thank you, Alison!)